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This Is Me

Jessie Bee

I am a seeker of God, a help-meet to my husband and a mother to my 3 children. I love hot lattes, good books, cold weather and anything that inspires me to be creative. I desire simplicity and authenticity, but often have to remind myself to seek those .

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Tuesday, June 21, 2011

When I began a relationship with my [now] husband 9 years ago, I knew how to cook two things: apple pie and pancakes.

About a year into our courtship, my husband went to a friend's house to have a sleepover.

Sleepover? Do guys even call it that?

In the morning, my husband's friend's mother made some pancakes. Apparently they were good pancakes. As in, better than my pancakes. The next time I saw her, she was wearing a crown and he kept referring to her as the "Pancake Queen."

You see my dilemma.

Since apple pie wasn't going to carry me through a marriage, my mom began a mad rush to teach me cooking essentials like searing meat, making a good roux, sauteing vegetables, roasting chicken, using a crock pot. Everything...except pizza. She left that up to Papa John, and all I learned from him was that pick up was $3 cheaper than delivery.

Eight years after the dreaded pancake episode, I feel I can probably succeed at almost any recipe I attempt. However pizza is to me what garlic bread is to my mom: a complete joke.

And that is what has brought me here, to Project Pizza. I am going on a journey in an attempt to make the PERFECT pizza, but with one caveat: it must be from scratch. No premade pizza sauce or packaged dough. Obviously I can't be expected to make my own cheese, and my tomato plant hasn't produced a single tomato since last November. Yes, obviously I expect a little grace.

With all that said, here is attempt #1. Okay, technically not attempt #1 or else I wouldn't know how truly pathetic my skills are. Like, have you ever had one half of your pizza rise 3 inches and the other half stay flat as a pancake? Not sure if that was my subconscious attempt to outperform the Pancake Queen by simultaneously cooking two dishes at once, but it'd probably be safe to say I failed. At least I don't remember getting a crown for it.

Okay, I know. At first glance it doesn't look too bad. Well, if you like pineapple on your pizza. If not, just squint and pretend its yellow peppers.

Then look closer....

Is it just me or did all my pizza dough somehow manage to scoot to the outer edges and form a tumor?

Oh, and you know that magic trick where they put someone in a box and pretend to saw someone in half. Pretty sure I did it wrong.

Or maybe I was just trying to extricate the tumor? And no matter how great (or odd) a pizza looks, perfection includes the taste. This one tasted slightly too yeasty.

If this were a throwdown, then Bobby Flay won. Stay tuned for round 2.